


12 Drummers Drumming

by PoeFaraday



Series: 12 Days of Musketeermas [1]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: 12 Days of Christmas Prompts, Christmas Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 04:03:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2758934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoeFaraday/pseuds/PoeFaraday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The boys begin unpacking ornaments, and d'Artagnan discovers that Porthos has something of a drum obsession.</p>
            </blockquote>





	12 Drummers Drumming

Between Porthos and d’Artagnan, it took about twenty-three minutes to pick apart the puzzle that was the storage boxes in the cellar to get to the ones that held all the Christmas ornaments in such a way that the whole scheme of them wouldn’t come crashing down around them. Aramis, of course, sat unhelpfully by, insisting that he’d only be in the way, that he’s better at helping visualize the entire picture. In the end, they’ve pulled out the three boxes of ornaments, and replaced the rest of the storage boxes in some kind of order.

 

“Don’t think you’re gettin’ out of helpin’ us bring them upstairs,” Porthos grunts, handing Aramis a box.

 

The three carry their boxes up to the living room, where they push the coffee table out of the way and place the boxes on the carpet, sitting on the floor. D’Artagnan is the first to open his box; he is the newest addition to this little family, and as such, he does not have many of his own heirlooms or memories about the house and traditions such as these.

 

“Anyone want anything?” Aramis says, heading into the kitchen as d’Artagnan begins exploring the contents of the ornament box. “I’m making more coffee - the stuff from earlier’s gone stale, I’m sure.”

  
“Aramis, you made it--” Porthos glances up at the wall clock, which, to be fair is a few minutes slow, “--two and a half hours ago. It’s barely half past ten.”

 

“Do you want some or not?” Aramis calls back.

 

“...Yeah, alright, I’ll have one.”

 

“What is this?” d’Artagnan asks, drawing out what appears to be a handmade ornament from 1986. The papier mache is a little faded, but the structure’s held up pretty well. In a teacher’s careful penmanship, the name “Porthos du Vallon” is inked into the side.

 

Porthos is quick to hide his blush. “Made that in kindergarten,” he replies, reaching for the ornament.

 

“What’s it supposed to be?” d’Artagnan asks.

 

The scarlet in Porthos’s cheeks brightens. “It’s supposed to be a drum. Twice a week from about halfway through November til Christmas, we made an ornament based off the Twelve Days of Christmas… This is the only one that survived.”

 

“I think it’s lovely,” Aramis chimes in, coming back into the room with two mugs of steaming coffee, which he places on the table.

 

“You and your mother,” Porthos grunts, but he can’t hide his grin. “You’d think anything was lovely, so long as I made it.”

 

Aramis grins, winking at him. “You make it sound so romantic.”

 

“Yeah, well,” Porthos grunts, noncommittal, as he digs through his box of ornaments. He smiles fondly as memories flush to color his cheeks as he pulls out another ornament. This one is shaped like a nutcracker, with a fully functional lever in the back so that if d’Artagnan could find a nut small enough to fit between its little wooden teeth, he could crack it open. The nutcracker was brilliantly painted and had a little drum attached to his front, and two tiny wooden mallets in his hands.

 

“Ah, I remember that one well,” Aramis smiles. “Belgium wasn’t it? Snowed in for three days.”

 

“Not that you cared,” Porthos teases back, and d’Artagnan smiles at the two, impossibly fond of the both of them, even if he feels a little left out of the memory. Porthos turns to smile at him, displaying the ornament. “Aramis and I decided - against my better judgment, I should add - to spend the week before Christmas in Belgium. Snowed like the dickens. When it finally stopped, and Aramis untangled himself from the sheets long enough to go dig out the car, he claimed he was going out to buy a few groceries to tide us over. He came back with a Black Forest cake and this little thing.”

 

D’Artagnan grins, picturing Aramis bundled up from head to toe, walking through the door with a cake and no actual proper groceries. He can imagine Porthos’s eyebrow, bisected by its old scar, raised in curiosity. He may not have been there, but he can put this scene into his mind so easily that he almost shares the memory. Now Aramis reaches into Porthos’s box, making a face that would suggest disgust, if it wasn’t twisted into a grin.

 

“You still have this damn thing?” he asks, pulling out an ornament that was probably a product of the 90s. It’s shaped like one of those electric drum kits, and d’Artagnan realizes to his rather immediate chagrin that it’s actually functional, just as Aramis slides the switch over. Porthos lunges suddenly, arms outstretched. “Aramis don’t--” he half-cries, trying to grab the ornament, but he’s a second too late. Aramis has pressed the button.

 

The ornament begins to play a horrible drum riff, straight out of a boy band song circa 1997. Aramis cackles and after a moment, concedes to Porthos, allowing him to turn off the music. “I thought we agreed that one was getting thrown out last year,” Aramis grins.

 

“I’d ask if nostalgia meant nothing to you, but we both know that’s not true,” Porthos grunts, turning the switch off.

 

“Romantic nostalgia, absolutely. This thing…” Aramis replies, barely concealing his grin, “this is just an atrocity.”

D’Artagnan returns to his box, giggling as Porthos plays keep-away with the drum kit ornament as Aramis tries to snatch it from him. The one he pulls out is another drum - he’s beginning to sense a trend in Porthos’s ornaments of choice - but he studies it curiously. It looks handmade, and it’s in the shape of an African drum, the kind he’s seen before but doesn’t know the name of.

 

“It’s a djembe,” Porthos tells him after a moment, as if he knew the question was on d’Artagnan’s mind. “My, ah...uncle brought that back for me from his trip to Tanzania.”

 

D’Artagnan smiles, looking at the miniature djembe with fondness and curiosity. “It’s beautiful. That one has to go on the tree.”

 

“It makes it on every year,” Porthos replies. “It’s my favorite.”

 

There’s a sound like thunder, and as d’Artagnan looks up, he realizes it’s Athos stumbling down the stairs. Their housemate appears in the sitting room, hair sticking out at odd angles and his pajama trousers sitting low and askew on his waist. His eyes are sleep-narrowed, and the scowl that d’Artagnan loves so much to kiss off his face is fixed firmly in place.

 

“Stupid bloody town parade,” he mutters, frowning at the window. D’Artagnan looks outside, as do Porthos and Aramis. “Stupid bloody marching band.”

  
“I suppose that’s what you get for choosing a house on the parade route,” Aramis clucks. “They do this every year, you know.”


End file.
